Archive for February 2015

With the 2015 General Election less distant than it’s ever been, it’s time for facts. And don’t worry, the Conservatives have lots of facts on their social media campaign, Share the Facts.

Because you can’t pay people money to vote, the Conservatives are instead offering slightly pathetic rewards (including limited edition mugs, window stickers and badges!!!) to plebs, in exchange for sharing Tory promotional materials online. It has a leaderboard and everything. Unfortunately, to see that, you have to sign in with your Facebook account, and, frankly, fuck that shit: our journalistic integrity runs out at handing the keys to our social media over to the 33rd Duke of Beafberger and a spotty kid with a Foundation Degree in Social Media Marketing.

Nonetheless, we would like to share with you some of the facts from Share the Facts.

It’s important to emphasise that everything on this poster is facts. It’s facts that Ed Miliband’s goofy, distorted face is your worst nightmare, and that him having reconstructive surgery to correct his stretched face would make an already harrowing nocturnal hallucination worse. It’s also facts that the SNP would definitely prop up Ed Miliband—perhaps holding him steady whilst the surgeons perform the delicate facial restoration—and that an Ed Miliband with a normal face would mean chaos for Britain. Chaos. We must not let him acquire a normal face. Facts.

Here, Share the Facts asks you to share a fact that a Labour Lord has said. But only this one fact. Don’t share the fact that he also said:

Actually, do share that. Share them both, and demonstrate that, even if you don’t get a drinks coaster out of the deal, you understand that famous people often say words.

Fact: Ed Miliband has a huge hand growing at an awkward angle out of his chest.

Fact: his freak-hand can be used to emphasise points in his notes by writing them in a flawless facsimile of default Adobe font Myriad Pro.

In this fact, we are asked to imagine something. This is the first instance in which the Conservatives make it explicit that their fact isn’t, in fact, a fact. This is a thought experiment of a terrifying alternate reality, in which pressing a ‘pledge’ button to promise to vote will stop a specific man from becoming prime minister.

Is this the future of electronic democratic engagement? In 20 years’ time, will we see an unflattering picture of our political leaders imploring IMAGINE IF PRESSING PLEDGE MEANT ANYTHING, PLEDGE TO PLEDGE TODAY?

Do you remember the facts about 2002, when rampaging benefits tore down a shopping street in East London, leaving nothing but flaming piles of taxpayers’ money in their wake? Benefits were out of control, benefitting everyone whether they needed benefits or not. Platonic relationships everywhere broke down due to all friends suddenly having benefits.

This fact contains two facts. Fact 1: bar graphs are really hard to make in the Tories’ favourite graphic design package. Fact 2: under the Conservatives, electioneering would not be capped; anyone can claim that benefits claimants claim more than is even vaguely plausible.

I mean, is that scale linear, logarithmic, or just plain bullshit?

The facts about Share the Facts

This would have earned the official Conservatives Twitter account 260 points on the Share the Facts leaderboard, which would put them in the running for a limited edition bottle of aromatherapy bubble bath in the shape of David Cameron’s face.

Imagine if you not voting meant that the Conservatives had wasted their strategic digital vision consultants’ effort constructing an ultimately pointless and demeaning promotional exercise.

All of the facts in this list are facts.

Here’s the most critical fact: the Conservative Party are cack-handedly pursuing a populist and reductive campaigning strategy that will fail and be forgotten. Perhaps they should have called it the Big Societal Media.